Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
The
VOIDRUNNER'S CODEX
is coming! Explore new worlds, fight oppressive empires, fend off fearsome aliens, and wield deadly psionics with this comprehensive boxed set expansion for 5E and A5E!
Community
Playing the Game
Story Hour
A Rose In The Wind: A Saga of the Halmae -- Updated June 19, 2014
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Ilex" data-source="post: 5086829" data-attributes="member: 82687"><p><strong>10x01</strong></p><p></p><p>The wind howled.</p><p></p><p>Kormick slogged forward, periodically grabbing his brimmed hat as it attempted to take flight and tugging it back down as low as he could on his forehead. It was daytime, but it was dark. And cold.</p><p></p><p>He spared a glance around at the group and wished he hadn't. The wind drove like a dart into his eyes and, as he blinked them clear, he saw Savina clutching at her once-fine, now travel-stained cloak, pulling it close over her dirt-spattered armor as she struggled over a log. Tavi tried to give her a hand but he only made it worse, tugging her forward too quickly so that she tripped and let out a sound that might be tears, if it were not so full of frustration. </p><p></p><p>Then there were the dwarves: the pregnant women, the children. And the former slaves with the current slave in their midst, putting one foot in front of the other with the grim fortitude of the choiceless – or of the vengeful. Arden happened to glance up as Kormick was considering that last point, and Kormick thought he read comradeship rather than murder in the gleam of her eyes as they met his from the shadows of her hood. </p><p></p><p>Of course, in his experience, comradeship and murder often went hand-in-hand. </p><p></p><p>Mena and Twiggy trudged on either side of Rose. Mena was stoic, as usual, but Twiggy and Rose clung to one another in a combination of determination and misery. “How are you doing?” asked Twiggy—a question she asked often of Rose, and this time (like most others), she got a standard reply: “Fine.” </p><p></p><p>“No,” Twiggy pressed, “how are you <em>doing?</em>”</p><p></p><p>“Ask me tonight,” Rose replied. <em>After we get to the spring,</em> thought Kormick, silently finishing her unspoken point. <em><strong>If</strong> we get there.</em></p><p></p><p>With a growl of thunder, a barrage of rain pelted down out of the roiling clouds for the first time. The wind howled in answer and blew the raindrops nearly sideways. Kormick grabbed his hat again and thought murderous thoughts of his own about bickering goddess-sisters. </p><p></p><p>The path, appropriately, chose this moment to vanish almost entirely: between them, he and Twiggy made their best guess about its direction and they pressed on, hoping they'd guessed right. They grew soaked from the fitful rain as they clambered over moss-covered rocks and forced their way through knee-high scrub, wet leaves and twigs fluttering against their faces and striking their knees. Kormick's boots began to squish and squelch with every step.</p><p></p><p>And then, at the bottom of a slope, he pushed through a tangle of branches into sudden openness and saw that they'd arrived.</p><p></p><p>He'd stepped into small valley that was rimmed by high, tree-covered slopes and overhung with storm clouds. The wind gusted through the trees but the valley itself was sheltered from the worst of it, and before him, at the center of a meadow, fed by no streams, lay a pool of water, heavy rain dancing on its surface. It looked like nothing special, and yet he had no doubts. They'd found the spring.</p><p></p><p>"What do you know," he muttered to himself. </p><p></p><p>As the others caught up to him, they spread out along the treeline and stopped, their gazes arrested by the sight before them. No one moved and no one spoke; they would have had to shout above the noise of the wind in the trees and the splattering rain. Kormick looked a question at Mena, but before she could answer, Savina stepped forward.</p><p></p><p>The girl in the flowered armor and the torn blue and green robes, her tangled hair streaming out behind her, made a strange but lovely sight as she walked alone over the grass toward the water. She even skipped a few steps, the movement light, like a child playing or a barmaid dancing the grifter's galliard: incredulously, Kormick had to concede that she looked <em>happy</em>.</p><p></p><p>Suddenly Rose set out behind her, Twiggy followed Rose, and then the whole group followed Twiggy.</p><p></p><p>Savina was kneeling by the water by the time they reached her. She looked up at them with a radiant smile and announced, "This is it! I can feel it!"</p><p></p><p>She bowed her head and began to pray.</p><p></p><p>Kormick glanced warily back at the tossing treeline. With the storm swirling around them, they wouldn't be able to hear an army of ten thousand bearing down upon the valley, much less a stealthy pack of derro. Nyoko and Sertani had clearly had the same thought – they were standing guard at the back of the group. Nyoko had an arrow on the string, just in case.</p><p></p><p>Satisfied, Kormick turned back to see what the famous spring had to offer.</p><p></p><p>Savina continued to pray.</p><p></p><p>Nothing happened.</p><p></p><p>"Anybody remember Mother saying anything in particular about making this thing work?" asked Tavi.</p><p></p><p>"I couldn’t exactly ask her to write down the procedure for me before we left," said Rose dryly. "That's why I brought an Alirrian priestess."</p><p></p><p>"They just prayed, and the oracle spoke," said Twiggy. "At least that's all Dona Giovanna ever said." </p><p></p><p>Savina opened her eyes and looked up at them. She wasn't looking so happy now – she looked nervous. "I – I'm not a priestess yet, not really," she said. "This is a little bit out of my experience… I'm trying... but I don't know exactly what to say."</p><p></p><p>"The gods don't care exactly what you say," said Kormick. "Think of me saying those funeral prayers. I didn't know exactly what to say, but it's not like Kettenek is a stickler for proper grammar." </p><p></p><p>Everyone from Tavi to the slave spun to stare at him with the expressions of bemused skepticism that Kormick was coming to know well. </p><p></p><p>"Joking," he proclaimed, with a too-hearty laugh. "Joking, joking . . . of course the God of Law and Justice and Rules and Death and whatever else is terrifically fussy about verb tenses. But Alirria is not, yes? Carry on praying."</p><p></p><p>"I wonder … " said Twiggy. She reached down and touched the water carefully. "No," she answered herself. "It's just water. I don't think it would help to enchant it." </p><p></p><p>Rose knelt beside Twiggy and Savina and touched the water for herself. Kormick saw Mena stiffen and instinctively braced himself, too, but again – nothing happened. The water drops ran through Rose's fingers, the rain continued to pour down, the treetops on the hillsides continued to shudder and bow in the gusts of wind.</p><p></p><p>"We could try doing something with that vial of spring water from the underground chapel…" mused Twiggy.</p><p></p><p>"I don't think we want to waste that," said Tavi.</p><p></p><p>"It wouldn't be a waste if it gave us what we're after."</p><p></p><p>"No, but I don't see how it would help – "</p><p></p><p>Kormick didn't, either. Strangely, he thought he knew the answer to this dilemma. And it wasn't an answer he would ever have expected to be endorsing.</p><p></p><p>"Friends, friends," he called out over another roll of thunder. "The young lady simply needs to keep praying. Give her some time."</p><p></p><p>"There has to be a reason that Alirria gave us that vial, though," said Twiggy.</p><p></p><p>"Am <em>I</em> the only one here with faith?" demanded Kormick. He really <em>did</em> have faith, he thought, no longer surprised. At least, he had faith in <em>her</em> faith. "Go on," he told Savina's nervous face. "Keep it up, keep it up."</p><p></p><p>Savina bowed her head once more. Tavi stepped up and put his cloak around her, trying to shelter her from the storm as best he could.</p><p></p><p>"Signora," said Kormick, addressing Rose. "It could not hurt for you to pray, too, could it? Of course not."</p><p></p><p>Rose raised her eyebrows, but then bowed her head.</p><p></p><p><em>Might as well set a good example for the kids,</em> Kormick thought. He scrounged around in his pack and found his holy text. It only contained Kettenite prayers, of course, but surely the goddess – <em>once we accept the premise of a magical spring with a magical talking goddess, we can’t be too stubborn about the rulebook</em> – would cut him some slack. </p><p></p><p>Kormick stepped up beside the girls, took his hat off, knelt down, and opened his book, ignoring the looks he was getting from Tavi, Mena, and Arden. "Hoo-kay," he grunted. Sheltering the book with his cloak from the worst of the rain, he opened it at random and silently began running his eyes over the words, mentally changing the ponderous invocations from "Earth Father" and "Lawgiver" and "Just Justice of the Just" to "Holy Mother" and “Lifegiver” and “mumblesomethingmumble” whenever he remembered.</p><p></p><p>So they prayed, the three of them.</p><p></p><p>And the rain came down.</p><p></p><p>And time passed. </p><p></p><p>###</p><p></p><p>After nearly an hour, Savina had used every prayer she could remember and a few she had probably gotten wrong. She was cold, her knees were sore and wet, and she was exhausted. This was not how she'd imagined her first Alirria Ascendant away from the Temple. Alirria Ascendant was a day of peace, of rest, of quiet fasting and contemplation. For Savina, it had been a day of discomfort, followed by delight, followed by insecurity and desperation. </p><p></p><p>She mentally recited the closing words to one more prayer and then her mind's voice fell silent. She felt blank, emptied out. Or maybe she didn't feel anything at all. </p><p></p><p>Into that still, calm emptiness came a voice, watery and echoing, like drops in the well of her mind. </p><p></p><p>"Call to me and I will answer."</p><p></p><p>Without another thought, Savina put her hand into the water and spoke. "Alirria. Come to us." And she channeled the power of her divine goddess through her soul and into the Spring.</p><p></p><p>She felt bubbles against her fingers, and then currents, and then the waters of the pool began to churn from below. "She's coming…" Savina whispered.</p><p></p><p>Next to her, Kormick stood and put on his black hat. She felt the others gathering close behind her. She spared a glance at Rose, next to her, who was pale but still, watching the water.</p><p></p><p>A column of water spun itself up from the center of the pool and took the shape of a woman, her features changing and flowing – older faces and younger faces washed past. Savina thought she saw her mother's. Maybe her sister's. Behind her, she heard a quick intake of breath from Kormick and a murmur of surprise from Twiggy. She wondered if they were recognizing different faces.</p><p></p><p>The figure looked down at Rose, and despite her changing features, her expectant expression was obvious.</p><p></p><p>Rose stood up. She had to speak loudly over the pattering rain and the gusting wind. "Do you know who I am?" she asked.</p><p></p><p>The women's faces smiled. <span style="color: blue">I know who has laid claim to you</span>, she said. <span style="color: blue">Who you are remains to be written.</span></p><p></p><p>Rose hesitated, then took a deep breath. "I wish to know what destiny holds for me … and how I can thwart it, if I may."</p><p></p><p>The figure cocked her head and began to speak: <span style="color: blue">Find the last breath – </span> </p><p></p><p>Suddenly, there were arrows everywhere among the raindrops. </p><p></p><p>Nyoko shouted a warning. The derro had caught up at last.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Ilex, post: 5086829, member: 82687"] [b]10x01[/b] The wind howled. Kormick slogged forward, periodically grabbing his brimmed hat as it attempted to take flight and tugging it back down as low as he could on his forehead. It was daytime, but it was dark. And cold. He spared a glance around at the group and wished he hadn't. The wind drove like a dart into his eyes and, as he blinked them clear, he saw Savina clutching at her once-fine, now travel-stained cloak, pulling it close over her dirt-spattered armor as she struggled over a log. Tavi tried to give her a hand but he only made it worse, tugging her forward too quickly so that she tripped and let out a sound that might be tears, if it were not so full of frustration. Then there were the dwarves: the pregnant women, the children. And the former slaves with the current slave in their midst, putting one foot in front of the other with the grim fortitude of the choiceless – or of the vengeful. Arden happened to glance up as Kormick was considering that last point, and Kormick thought he read comradeship rather than murder in the gleam of her eyes as they met his from the shadows of her hood. Of course, in his experience, comradeship and murder often went hand-in-hand. Mena and Twiggy trudged on either side of Rose. Mena was stoic, as usual, but Twiggy and Rose clung to one another in a combination of determination and misery. “How are you doing?” asked Twiggy—a question she asked often of Rose, and this time (like most others), she got a standard reply: “Fine.” “No,” Twiggy pressed, “how are you [i]doing?[/i]” “Ask me tonight,” Rose replied. [i]After we get to the spring,[/i] thought Kormick, silently finishing her unspoken point. [i][b]If[/b] we get there.[/i] With a growl of thunder, a barrage of rain pelted down out of the roiling clouds for the first time. The wind howled in answer and blew the raindrops nearly sideways. Kormick grabbed his hat again and thought murderous thoughts of his own about bickering goddess-sisters. The path, appropriately, chose this moment to vanish almost entirely: between them, he and Twiggy made their best guess about its direction and they pressed on, hoping they'd guessed right. They grew soaked from the fitful rain as they clambered over moss-covered rocks and forced their way through knee-high scrub, wet leaves and twigs fluttering against their faces and striking their knees. Kormick's boots began to squish and squelch with every step. And then, at the bottom of a slope, he pushed through a tangle of branches into sudden openness and saw that they'd arrived. He'd stepped into small valley that was rimmed by high, tree-covered slopes and overhung with storm clouds. The wind gusted through the trees but the valley itself was sheltered from the worst of it, and before him, at the center of a meadow, fed by no streams, lay a pool of water, heavy rain dancing on its surface. It looked like nothing special, and yet he had no doubts. They'd found the spring. "What do you know," he muttered to himself. As the others caught up to him, they spread out along the treeline and stopped, their gazes arrested by the sight before them. No one moved and no one spoke; they would have had to shout above the noise of the wind in the trees and the splattering rain. Kormick looked a question at Mena, but before she could answer, Savina stepped forward. The girl in the flowered armor and the torn blue and green robes, her tangled hair streaming out behind her, made a strange but lovely sight as she walked alone over the grass toward the water. She even skipped a few steps, the movement light, like a child playing or a barmaid dancing the grifter's galliard: incredulously, Kormick had to concede that she looked [i]happy[/i]. Suddenly Rose set out behind her, Twiggy followed Rose, and then the whole group followed Twiggy. Savina was kneeling by the water by the time they reached her. She looked up at them with a radiant smile and announced, "This is it! I can feel it!" She bowed her head and began to pray. Kormick glanced warily back at the tossing treeline. With the storm swirling around them, they wouldn't be able to hear an army of ten thousand bearing down upon the valley, much less a stealthy pack of derro. Nyoko and Sertani had clearly had the same thought – they were standing guard at the back of the group. Nyoko had an arrow on the string, just in case. Satisfied, Kormick turned back to see what the famous spring had to offer. Savina continued to pray. Nothing happened. "Anybody remember Mother saying anything in particular about making this thing work?" asked Tavi. "I couldn’t exactly ask her to write down the procedure for me before we left," said Rose dryly. "That's why I brought an Alirrian priestess." "They just prayed, and the oracle spoke," said Twiggy. "At least that's all Dona Giovanna ever said." Savina opened her eyes and looked up at them. She wasn't looking so happy now – she looked nervous. "I – I'm not a priestess yet, not really," she said. "This is a little bit out of my experience… I'm trying... but I don't know exactly what to say." "The gods don't care exactly what you say," said Kormick. "Think of me saying those funeral prayers. I didn't know exactly what to say, but it's not like Kettenek is a stickler for proper grammar." Everyone from Tavi to the slave spun to stare at him with the expressions of bemused skepticism that Kormick was coming to know well. "Joking," he proclaimed, with a too-hearty laugh. "Joking, joking . . . of course the God of Law and Justice and Rules and Death and whatever else is terrifically fussy about verb tenses. But Alirria is not, yes? Carry on praying." "I wonder … " said Twiggy. She reached down and touched the water carefully. "No," she answered herself. "It's just water. I don't think it would help to enchant it." Rose knelt beside Twiggy and Savina and touched the water for herself. Kormick saw Mena stiffen and instinctively braced himself, too, but again – nothing happened. The water drops ran through Rose's fingers, the rain continued to pour down, the treetops on the hillsides continued to shudder and bow in the gusts of wind. "We could try doing something with that vial of spring water from the underground chapel…" mused Twiggy. "I don't think we want to waste that," said Tavi. "It wouldn't be a waste if it gave us what we're after." "No, but I don't see how it would help – " Kormick didn't, either. Strangely, he thought he knew the answer to this dilemma. And it wasn't an answer he would ever have expected to be endorsing. "Friends, friends," he called out over another roll of thunder. "The young lady simply needs to keep praying. Give her some time." "There has to be a reason that Alirria gave us that vial, though," said Twiggy. "Am [i]I[/i] the only one here with faith?" demanded Kormick. He really [i]did[/i] have faith, he thought, no longer surprised. At least, he had faith in [i]her[/i] faith. "Go on," he told Savina's nervous face. "Keep it up, keep it up." Savina bowed her head once more. Tavi stepped up and put his cloak around her, trying to shelter her from the storm as best he could. "Signora," said Kormick, addressing Rose. "It could not hurt for you to pray, too, could it? Of course not." Rose raised her eyebrows, but then bowed her head. [i]Might as well set a good example for the kids,[/i] Kormick thought. He scrounged around in his pack and found his holy text. It only contained Kettenite prayers, of course, but surely the goddess – [i]once we accept the premise of a magical spring with a magical talking goddess, we can’t be too stubborn about the rulebook[/i] – would cut him some slack. Kormick stepped up beside the girls, took his hat off, knelt down, and opened his book, ignoring the looks he was getting from Tavi, Mena, and Arden. "Hoo-kay," he grunted. Sheltering the book with his cloak from the worst of the rain, he opened it at random and silently began running his eyes over the words, mentally changing the ponderous invocations from "Earth Father" and "Lawgiver" and "Just Justice of the Just" to "Holy Mother" and “Lifegiver” and “mumblesomethingmumble” whenever he remembered. So they prayed, the three of them. And the rain came down. And time passed. ### After nearly an hour, Savina had used every prayer she could remember and a few she had probably gotten wrong. She was cold, her knees were sore and wet, and she was exhausted. This was not how she'd imagined her first Alirria Ascendant away from the Temple. Alirria Ascendant was a day of peace, of rest, of quiet fasting and contemplation. For Savina, it had been a day of discomfort, followed by delight, followed by insecurity and desperation. She mentally recited the closing words to one more prayer and then her mind's voice fell silent. She felt blank, emptied out. Or maybe she didn't feel anything at all. Into that still, calm emptiness came a voice, watery and echoing, like drops in the well of her mind. "Call to me and I will answer." Without another thought, Savina put her hand into the water and spoke. "Alirria. Come to us." And she channeled the power of her divine goddess through her soul and into the Spring. She felt bubbles against her fingers, and then currents, and then the waters of the pool began to churn from below. "She's coming…" Savina whispered. Next to her, Kormick stood and put on his black hat. She felt the others gathering close behind her. She spared a glance at Rose, next to her, who was pale but still, watching the water. A column of water spun itself up from the center of the pool and took the shape of a woman, her features changing and flowing – older faces and younger faces washed past. Savina thought she saw her mother's. Maybe her sister's. Behind her, she heard a quick intake of breath from Kormick and a murmur of surprise from Twiggy. She wondered if they were recognizing different faces. The figure looked down at Rose, and despite her changing features, her expectant expression was obvious. Rose stood up. She had to speak loudly over the pattering rain and the gusting wind. "Do you know who I am?" she asked. The women's faces smiled. [color=blue]I know who has laid claim to you[/color], she said. [color=blue]Who you are remains to be written.[/color] Rose hesitated, then took a deep breath. "I wish to know what destiny holds for me … and how I can thwart it, if I may." The figure cocked her head and began to speak: [color=blue]Find the last breath – [/color] Suddenly, there were arrows everywhere among the raindrops. Nyoko shouted a warning. The derro had caught up at last. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
Playing the Game
Story Hour
A Rose In The Wind: A Saga of the Halmae -- Updated June 19, 2014
Top